Omerta raises uncomfortable questions but does not provide any answers: Hansal Mehta

Same is the case with Rajkummar. I found the story very interesting. After the premiere, a lot of women came up to me asking about Rajkummar. There is a scene where Shahid Azmi aka Rajkummar Rao has a conversation with Omar (played by Prabal Panjabi). I have to aid that process because work gets better this way. You have to see this body of work in conjunction.”
As the conversation came to an end, the one thing that we were keen to know was why does Rajkummar Rao and Hansal Mehta end up dealing with subjects which are serious in nature. Raj got so much violence within himself. If Manoj has a process, my job is to help him with that. The National Award-winning director-actor duo are back with their latest collaboration Omerta. However, before turning into a terrorist, Omar was an impressive student who eventually dropped out of the London School of Economics. We had a premiere there at a festival. The violence in that sequence is incredible, even without any graphics. “Rajkummar pushes me and himself to the core. The Italian women found him hot and sexy. We asked the director if there is a possibility of a film with a lighter tone, and the director responded, “Hopefully.”
He continued, “There is a subject we are working on. It is an uncomfortable film which will raise uncomfortable questions and answers that we have to compel our establishment to find,” said the Citylights director. In the same breath, Hansal credited the success of the film in these festivals to Rajkummar Rao who owned the character in every possible manner. Both of us are absurdly funny. The idea is to allow the actor to explore and blossom. He said, “At the time when Mukul told me the story, the internet was really slow. The sound, look and Raj, it scares you. Related News
Hansal Mehta: I will always regret that I could not make a movie with SrideviRajkummar Rao: I was very disturbed while shooting for OmertaOmerta director Hansal Mehta: With Rajkummar Rao, no challenge seems insurmountableShahid, Citylights, Aligarh and now Omerta, Hansal Mehta’s love for complex stories in no secret and his frequent collaborator in this journey is versatile actor Rajkummar Rao. It is interesting and horrifying how an intelligent and well-educated person chose to be a terrorist. It just happened. “Not really (the film would not touch upon the backstory of Omar). I had to buy a lot of books, lots of material from archives, different magazines and what not. What happens with scripts is that you eventually start writing. I was developing the script, it was in process, and Shahid happened,” said the Aligarh director. The director is a parent. I was not scared but this was a different person and I was happy he was not the Raj I would want to spend the time in the evening,” quipped Hansal. The film, which will hit screens on April 20, touches upon incidents in the life of terrorist Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, who is responsible for the 1994 kidnapping of four foreign tourists in Delhi and the 2002 kidnapping and murder of journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan among others. In fact, he is considered to have a hand in the 9/11 attacks in the US in 2001 and the 26/11 Mumbai attacks in 2008 too. He credited Rajkummar Rao for the project finally taking flight, “I think every film has its own destiny. We mix and match our interpretation and bring something new together.”
Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh is the personification of evil. This (Omerta) could have gone for five more years.”
Omerta, which received immense love and acclaim at its premiere at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival under Special Presentations section, has been the talking point around the world for more than a year now. While Omerta revisits Omar’s deeds, Hansal revealed that the film does not show the backstory of how this person became what he is but would raise a lot of questions in people’s mind. He (Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh) is the animal of terrorism.”
He then goes on to tell us how the idea was not something that struck him recently. He revealed that Rajkummar had become Omar to a level that it scared everyone around him. So, it was an interesting idea that I wanted to develop. He gave me this idea back in 2005 much before Rajkummar Rao had even made his entry in Bollywood. There is this thing about an evil personality that is attractive in a weird way,” recalled the director. And since we know the kind of bond Hansal and Rajkummar shares, we were keen to know if the director had helped him through the process in his own way. When asked what about Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh led to Hansal Mehta making the film? It soon became an obsession so much so that when I took a sabbatical in between even then I was constantly thinking about this project. He has been credited for the story and as a co-writer. It scares you. When we mentioned it to Hansal, he claimed, “Shahid and Omar are two sides of the same coin. The challenge of bringing out. When asked how he helped Rajkummar become Omar, Hansal answered, “By giving him space. In fact, the story was suggested by actor Mukul Dev in 2005 and since then, the director was ‘obsessing’ over it. In an exclusive conversation with indianexpress.com, the director answered, “I wanted to explore evil as a human characteristic and I found an actor (referring to Rajkummar Rao) who was ready to explore the same. That attracted me to the subject. Many do not know that Hansal’s film Shahid had a reference to Omar. But you see, humour and comedy are tough. “You should have seen the reaction to the film in Florence. 2018-03-16T07:21:55+00:00″>
Published: March 16, 2018 7:21 am